For Good
by Nienna100
Summary: It wasn't a dream. But this is. One of a series of unlinked oneshots, songifcs, inspired by seeing Wicked too soon after CofE. Spoilers obviously. Slash Janto.


**For Good**

**Summary: **One of a series of unlinked oneshots, songifcs, inspired by seeing Wicked too soon after CofE. Spoilers obviously my dears. Slash Janto.

The songs aren't in order and I won't be using all of them, or even all of those that I do use.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Torchwood or Wicked, but recommend you watch both.

_I've heard it said, that people come_

_Into our lives, for a reason._

_Bringing something we must learn_

Jack collapsed down. He was cold from the soaking rain, the one thing he did not like about the Welsh landscape. He was tired out from the long days which had just passed, and brought him so much grief. He was so full of emotion; the victory was numbed by grief and distress. Ianto had gone.

"You're Mr. Jones' partner, aren't you?" The voice of the elderly woman made Jack look up. The action in turn made droplets of water fall in his eyes. "I haven't seen him in a while." The word 'partner' barely registered in Jack's mind. Had Ianto lived longer, he could have been Jack's husband. They just had to wait a couple of years on this backwards, close-minded rock. It would begin opening up, slowly, slowly. But Ianto would never be a part of that.

"We've been away," Jack muttered. He looked away from the nosy neighbour and back down at his drawn up knees. Sitting on his dad lover's doorstep, in soaking clothes... Owen might have thought he was punishing himself, but truly, it was too difficult to step inside and see Ianto's ghost walking through.

"Have you lost your keys?" The woman persisted. "'Cos I have a spare pair." Jack could remember the first time he stood on this doorstep, two thousand years ago for him, waiting for obnoxiously long minutes until Ianto let him. Hough impeccably dressed, the young man's tie had been slightly wonky – the only sign that he had just darted into his clothes – and Jack had known of the bruises and half healed cuts the blue shirt hid. He had come, irresistibly drawn towards the Welshman after his cyber-girlfriend had died, and needing to learn what other secrets he had hidden. Two thousand years. He supposed that that made Ianto his longest partner.

Slowly, Jack became aware that the woman was expecting an answer, and that wetness from the Welcome mat we has sitting on was seeping through to his skin, along with the moisture drawn down from his clothes. He held up a bunch of keys. "I'm fine, thanks." Reluctantly, in order to get away from the suspicious eyes, Jack dragged himself to his feet, hauling his ancient body upwards. He slotted in the key and turned the highly polished handle.

_And we are led_

_To those who help us most to grow_

The moment the door clicked closed behind him, the memories swelled up, with the power of a stormy sea, the waves as unstoppable as the bullet which had hit Toshiko. Every tear blurred room in this house held such strong memories: the hallway where they had had violently passionate, impatient sex, having not had the restraint to make it to a more civilized room; the lounge, with the sofa which still held to the mouldings of their bodies after long days which had turned into long nights of sleeplessness. They had watched stupid movies, had fits of sniggers over late night TV – Ianto was so cute when he laughed – fed each other popcorn, and fallen asleep in the twee hours, warm bodies pressed against each other, too lazy to fetch a blanket; the kitchen, filled with the phantom smells of coffee in the mornings, and Ianto's home cooking in the evenings. Once Jack had attempted a simple pasta dish, but had been distracted by the fact that the kitchen surfaces were just the right height for several of his favourite positions – every position which involved enough touch was one of Jack's favourite positions – but after that, Ianto had never let him cook again.

At the end of the hallway, Jack reached the bedroom. Given their odd waking hours, Torchwood employees spent most of their time away from the Hub searching for sleep. It was not always easy to find; hence Jack and Ianto spent most of their time in this room. His hand trailing along the wall like a blind man, Jack forced himself into the room filled with so many sweet memories, he could almost smell them.

_If we let them_

_And we help them in return_

The bed was hastily made, for Ianto, but perfectly so for any normal person. His pyjamas were folded upon the pillow. On Jack's side of the bed, there lay an untidy pile of clothes that Ianto had scolded him for. Days ago. His hand shook as he stroked it over Ianto's pyjamas. Slowly, he lowered himself down onto the mattress. Every muscle burned, every tendon stiffly protested movement, and every cell ached with pain, and loss, and the pain of loss. Before he knew it, he was falling sideways.

Ianto had given him so much. His power was in the detail. Every smooth of the creases Jack's shoulders made in the coat, the coat itself, which no lover but Ianto had touched. The coffees at the exact moment Jack realised he needed one, the sly kisses in the private corners of the Hub, the pens he placed in Jack's desk, when he knew the older man had scattered all his throughout the Hub... Jack had no more energy with which to sob anymore. What had he done for Ianto but deny him the love he so richly deserved?

_Well I don't know if I believe that's true_

_But I know I'm who I am today_

So much had changed in the last two years... meagre months of the Earth's timeline. It was not fair of Jack to have affected it as much as he had. Ianto could have been alive if Jack had never given him a job at Torchwood. He had changed Ianto's life, changed Ianto's world, but Ianto had changed him.

He had come back for Ianto. He'd never done that before. The Doctor had changed him, and so had Ianto. He had made him love again. Jack closed his eyes, on the world, and pressed his face into Ianto's pillow. The Welshman's scent surrounded him.

_Because I knew you_

A gentle hand rubbed his shoulder. In an instant, Jack had flipped, and was pinning down the intruder, before he had even opened his eyes. Then he opened them. "Ianto?" Incredulity won over warring shock and fear. Suddenly, Jack could not breathe, not through grief, but through wild hope.

_Like a comet pulled from orbit_

_As it passes a sun_

"Yes Jack," The soft Welsh voice replied, with a gentle smile.

"You're dead," gasped Jack.

"Yet here I am," Ianto grinned. Then his face fell, at Jack's sheet white, frozen face. "Jack, relax. Breathe. It's alright."

"You can't be here," Jack replied.

Carefully, Ianto sat up, shimmying out from under the shaking man, in order to raise his hand to stroke Jack's cheek. "Calm down, deep breaths. Relax for me Jack."

Jack's breathing was harsh, as he forced himself to do as Ianto asked. He blinked, and then snapped his eyes open again; what if Ianto disappeared again? What if it wasn't Ianto but someone pretending to look like Ianto? "Prove you're Ianto. Tell me something only he could know."

"You were most angry about me losing the SUV because you left the stopwatch in the glove compartment," Ianto said with utter seriousness.

"How can you be here?" Jack gasped.

"How could I stay away?"

_Like a stream that meets a boulder_

_Halfway through a wood_

"You're dead," Jack repeated, but the had that caressed his cheek was warm. Ianto's only response was to nod. Choking, refusing to cry in front of his lover, Jack asked, "Are you a ghost?"

"No."

"Are you a dream?"

"Yes."

"Shit!" Jack stood up, abruptly, and threw himself to his feet. It wasn't fair. Was his own mind going to torture him in sleep now too? In a moment of utter fury, his arm shot out and cannoned into the wall. There was a crunch, and the physical pain was a welcome distraction from that inside him.

He heard a gentle sigh, felt it tickle his ear. Utterly familiar warm arms wrapped around his waist, and Jack could not resist relaxing back into the hold, tears streaming down his cheeks. "What did you go and do that for?" Ianto asked him. The Welshman's hand slid down Jack's arm, and encircled his wrist. Carefully, Ianto raised the hand and pressed his lips to Jack's healing knuckles.

"Why can't you be real? Why Ianto? Why does everything in my life have to disappear?" cried Jack. "Every time I find something good." He could only ask these questions to himself. He felt his body sagging, collapsing after five days of working, so exhaustedly hard. Ianto's arm held him upright.

"These things happen sometimes," Ianto soothed, tender hands moving Jack around so that they could face each other. Blue eyes met blue eyes filled with misery. "It's alright."

"These things always happen." The dismayed blue eyes lowered, and closed. Jack's forehead pressed into Ianto's shirted shoulder. "And they will always happen."

_Who can say if I've been changed for the better?_

_But because I knew you_

_I have been changed for good_

Ianto had no response – but Jack knew that already. "Why couldn't I tell that truth? Why couldn't tell you how I felt?" he demanded of the pinstripes under his skin.

There was a pause, weary, until one of Ianto's hands snaked up and cradled Jack's chin, turning the handsome face upwards. "Tell me now Jack."

"What's the point? You're just a figment of my imagination, telling me what my head wants to say. Making myself feel better. It's perverted and messed up. I'm perverted and messed up," Jack raged, tearing his eyes away from the man in front of him.

"Perverted yes, and messed up, a little. But I love you anyway Jack," Ianto reasoned softly.

"I can't even tell the you in my head that I love you," Jack protested, shaking his head so that his hair fell into his eyes. "I thought I had changed enough to say it, and mean it again. For a moment... I thought I felt it. But Ianto Jones lies in darkness. He won't see anything ever again."

_It may well be_

_That we will never meet again_

_In this lifetime_

"I saw you," whispered Ianto, his hands shaking Jack's shoulders. "In that darkness, into that impenetrable void, I saw your light. When you come back, I come with you."

"That's just what my brain wants me to say!" Jack protested.

Ianto shook his head and moved away from the older man. He threw himself down on the bed. "I travel across death for you! Yet you can't tell me you love me. I come back for you after you come back for me. I die and you just think I'm a fantasy."

Turning his back on the Welshman, Jack's head dropped. "That's all you are. Just a..."

"Jack bloody Harkness," snarled Ianto, in the same voice he used when verging on anger and impatience, mixed with a little amusement. Jack thought for a minute the younger man was about tot scold him for not picking up his socks. "You're too suspicious for your own good sometimes, and the rest of the time you're too trusting."

"I'm not supposed to trust dreams," Jack replied, leaning his weight back against the wall. "Last week I dreamt a giant duck ate Myfanwy! Are they dead to then? Not that... well Myfanwy... she wasn't dead then anyway."

"That's just because of that stupid phone advert the duck," Ianto pointed out, angrily. "Now would you stop talking about you for one second and hold me please, because, in case you haven't noticed, I'm dead! Please Jack." For the first time, Ianto's impeccable self-control wavered and faltered.

_So let me say before we part_

_So much of me_

_Is made of what I learned from you_

"Oh God, Ianto! I didn't think!" Without intending to, aware only that he was desperate to be holding Ianto, suddenly he was. Ianto buried in close.

"This is a dream for you, but it's death for me," Ianto whispered, his voice harsh. "I'm never going to see my family or my few friends ever again. I'll never see anyone but you. And I'll only see you if you tell me you love me. And I knew you don't believe I'm me, but I can prove it to you. When you woke up, you'll find a present addressed to you, in the top bedside drawer. Because... you don't have a birthday, so I was going to give you one."

Abruptly, Ianto stopped talking, and shuddered. "Jack, you're waking up. Don't... please it hurts."

"I was waking so I could check." The crease on concentration in his forehead disappeared at once.

Ianto thumped his lover's knee. "If you wake up, I go. I go forever. So... you say it and I can stay with you, or you don't say it, and I go back to the darkness."

"Ianto," Jack breathed, shocked at the possibility of someone who could stay with him, if he could save and be saved. "I... I love you. I do. I just couldn't say it. And... Ianto, you're going to go when I wake up anyway, and I'll be left on my own, as I would've been if I'd told you so weeks ago."

With a whimper, Ianto replied, "I'm staying right here. As long as you want me. Please let me stay here. Let me love you."

"Of course; there's nothing I've ever wanted more."

_You'll be with me_

_Like a handprint on my heart_

They lay together, as warm and content as they should have been, wound in each other's arms. "I'm not going to get much sleep nights am I?" Jack asked.

"You'll be able to... well, no," Ianto grinned up at his lover. "Well... I'll leave you alone to sleep sometimes... if you're lucky. And we don't have to be in this room. I think I can change things."

Jack smirked, and raised an eyebrow. "What about that lamp? I've never liked it."

"I like the lamp," Ianto protested. "My sister bought me that lamp." He frowned at it though, and a minute later, there were two standing on the table. "Tada."

"I've unleashed a monster," groaned Jack. "Must I have you forever?" he teased.

"Yes indeed. You complaining?"

"Never."

_And now whatever way our stories end_

"Can I stay here forever?" Jack asked, brushing his fingers through Ianto's hair, desperate for any texture.

"No, you have to go. You have to eat for one thing."

"No I don't," interrupted Jack. "I live forever."

"I'm not having you starve to death, repeatedly," Ianto growled. "And I'd probably get sick of you." He nudged Jack in the ribs as the older man bit own on his ear. "I was kidding, I was kidding!" Turning more serious, he continued, "You have to live. You have to show me everything this world has to offer, along with all the others. You have to live and love again."

"But I don't want to," whined Jack.

Ianto turned and pressed his lips to Jack's forehead. "Tough. Live for me when you're awake, and live with me when you're asleep."

"I love you," pointed out Jack.

"I know."

_I know you have re-written mine_

_By being my friend_

When Jack awoke, the first thing he did was to lean over and open the top drawer. There it was, just as Ianto had said, pristinely wrapped in metallic red paper – probably left over from Christmas – Ianto was a devil for recycling. He didn't open it, just pushed the drawer back in. He had all he'd ever need.

**A/N: So that wandered off the track of the song, but who cares. Love you if you review.**


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